Close Menu
TechCentralTechCentral

    Subscribe to the newsletter

    Get the best South African technology news and analysis delivered to your e-mail inbox every morning.

    Facebook X (Twitter) YouTube LinkedIn
    WhatsApp Facebook X (Twitter) LinkedIn YouTube
    TechCentralTechCentral
    • News

      South Africa loosens media ownership rules – but keeps one hand on the remote

      16 July 2025

      Eskom targets 32GW green energy shift by 2040

      16 July 2025

      MTN Group appoints new chief enterprise officer

      16 July 2025

      Kruger Park’s white rhinos get a hi-tech lifeline

      16 July 2025

      The real cost of a cashless economy

      16 July 2025
    • World

      Grok 4 arrives with bold claims and fresh controversy

      10 July 2025

      Samsung’s bet on folding phones faces major test

      10 July 2025

      Bitcoin pushes higher into record territory

      10 July 2025

      OpenAI to launch web browser in direct challenge to Google Chrome

      10 July 2025

      Cupertino vs Brussels: Apple challenges Big Tech crackdown

      7 July 2025
    • In-depth

      The 1940s visionary who imagined the Information Age

      14 July 2025

      MultiChoice is working on a wholesale overhaul of DStv

      10 July 2025

      Siemens is battling Big Tech for AI supremacy in factories

      24 June 2025

      The algorithm will sing now: why musicians should be worried about AI

      20 June 2025

      Meta bets $72-billion on AI – and investors love it

      17 June 2025
    • TCS

      TCS+ | Samsung unveils significant new safety feature for Galaxy A-series phones

      16 July 2025

      TCS+ | MVNX on the opportunities in South Africa’s booming MVNO market

      11 July 2025

      TCS | Connecting Saffas – Renier Lombard on The Lekker Network

      7 July 2025

      TechCentral Nexus S0E4: Takealot’s big Post Office jobs plan

      4 July 2025

      TCS | Tech, townships and tenacity: Spar’s plan to win with Spar2U

      3 July 2025
    • Opinion

      A smarter approach to digital transformation in ICT distribution

      15 July 2025

      In defence of equity alternatives for BEE

      30 June 2025

      E-commerce in ICT distribution: enabler or disruptor?

      30 June 2025

      South Africa pioneered drone laws a decade ago – now it must catch up

      17 June 2025

      AI and the future of ICT distribution

      16 June 2025
    • Company Hubs
      • Africa Data Centres
      • AfriGIS
      • Altron Digital Business
      • Altron Document Solutions
      • Altron Group
      • Arctic Wolf
      • AvertITD
      • Braintree
      • CallMiner
      • CambriLearn
      • CYBER1 Solutions
      • Digicloud Africa
      • Digimune
      • Domains.co.za
      • ESET
      • Euphoria Telecom
      • Incredible Business
      • iONLINE
      • Iris Network Systems
      • LSD Open
      • NEC XON
      • Network Platforms
      • Next DLP
      • Ovations
      • Paracon
      • Paratus
      • Q-KON
      • SevenC
      • SkyWire
      • Solid8 Technologies
      • Telit Cinterion
      • Tenable
      • Vertiv
      • Videri Digital
      • Wipro
      • Workday
    • Sections
      • AI and machine learning
      • Banking
      • Broadcasting and Media
      • Cloud services
      • Contact centres and CX
      • Cryptocurrencies
      • Education and skills
      • Electronics and hardware
      • Energy and sustainability
      • Enterprise software
      • Fintech
      • Information security
      • Internet and connectivity
      • Internet of Things
      • Investment
      • IT services
      • Lifestyle
      • Motoring
      • Public sector
      • Retail and e-commerce
      • Science
      • SMEs and start-ups
      • Social media
      • Talent and leadership
      • Telecoms
    • Events
    • Advertise
    TechCentralTechCentral
    Home » News » These African vaccine holdouts threaten world’s fight against Covid

    These African vaccine holdouts threaten world’s fight against Covid

    By Agency Staff20 May 2021
    Twitter LinkedIn Facebook WhatsApp Email Telegram Copy Link
    News Alerts
    WhatsApp

    A handful of vaccine holdouts in Africa — the world’s least-inoculated continent — could pose another big challenge for global efforts to end the pandemic.

    Burundi, Tanzania and Eritrea have so far rejected the World Health Organisation’s advice to register for Covax, an initiative to distribute vaccines to poorer countries, with some officials downplaying the impact of Covid-19 and effectiveness of jabs that have allowed several countries to begin opening up.

    The danger is that while the rest of the world slowly returns to normalcy, the virus will spread in these African nations, mutating into variants that can evade current vaccines, cause deadly new waves and spread far beyond their borders.

    Those variants are going to be a consistent threat not just to those countries — but globally

    “If you allow the virus to continue to circulate anywhere, it allows the virus to mutate,” said Shabir Madhi, a vaccinologist from Johannesburg’s University of the Witwatersrand, who led a trial of AstraZeneca’s shot in South Africa. “Those variants are going to be a consistent threat not just to those countries — but globally.”

    Together, the three African holdouts have a population of about 75 million, a little smaller than Germany’s, providing an ample reservoir for mutations to develop, much as they did in England, Brazil, South Africa and India. Highly transmissible variants first identified in those countries were later detected in different parts of the world.

    Most mutated

    And the most mutated version of the coronavirus discovered to date is believed to have come from Tanzania, where people go about their lives with minimal precautions and no vaccines ordered so far.

    “They declared they had no intention to join Covax,” Phionah Atuhebwe, the WHO’s new vaccines introduction medical officer for Africa, said. “We can only continue with advocacy.”

    So far, that advocacy hasn’t made much progress.

    In what seemed a break with his late predecessor, Burundi’s president, Evariste Ndayishimiye, declared in July that Covid-19 was the country’s “biggest enemy”. Former President Pierre Nkurunziza, who died in June amid speculation he’d contracted the virus, had scorned the disease and expelled WHO officials, saying his country was protected by God.

    Hakan Nural/Unsplash

    Yet almost a year on, Ndayishimiye has not secured vaccines, saying the battle had already been won. Burundi’s government says vaccines aren’t fully effective and long-term side effects are not understood though it’s allowed soldiers serving in peacekeeping missions overseas to receive them.

    “Our position is that these vaccines are still on a trial,” Thaddée Ndikumana, Burundi’s health minister, said on 4 May.

    Eritrea still hadn’t decided on its approach, information minister Yemane Ghebremeskel said. Tanzania has yet to order any doses though President Samia Suluhu Hassan has promised a shift in policy, with an advisory panel recommending the nation join Covax and resume publishing Covid-19 statistics halted last May. Her government has yet to say whether it’ll follow the recommendations.

    In a continent with the world’s lowest vaccination rate, just 24.2 million doses have been administered to a population of 1.3 billion

    Tanzania’s former president, John Magufuli, who dismissed the severity of the disease and advocated steam treatments, died in March of heart ailments. There was speculation he’d also succumbed to Covid.

    While there are other nations who’ve yet to immunise anyone, they at least plan to do so. Madagascar, which touted a herbal remedy, ultimately signed up for Covax on 1 April.

    “We have porous borders,” Atuhebwe said. “The biggest worry is the mutations.”

    Perils of waiting

    In a continent with the world’s lowest vaccination rate, just 24.2 million doses have been administered to a population of 1.3 billion, according to the Africa Centres for Disease Control and Prevention — the perils of waiting are already evident.

    Officially, Africa has confirmed about 4.7 million cases and 127 000 deaths, but testing’s been minimal with the exception of South Africa. Anecdotal evidence of oxygen shortages at hospitals indicates a more severe epidemic than is publicly acknowledged. In South Africa alone, the excess death rate, or deaths above what would normally be seen, is triple the number of people certified to have died from Covid-19.

    Travellers from Tanzania arriving in Angola were in March found to be carrying a variant of the virus that Tulio de Oliveira, director of Krisp, a South African scientific institute that conducts genetic testing, described as the most mutated yet. Another is spreading rapidly in Uganda and Rwanda, he said.

    There are concerns the latest mutations could spread further.

    While some measures to curb Covid-19 are now in place in all three countries, in Burundi and Tanzania the influence of denialist presidents lives on, even after their deaths.

    In Dar es Salaam, Tanzania’s commercial capital, food markets are busy, buses crowded and bars full, while churches and mosques are packed with worshippers, most without masks.

    “I don’t think that coronavirus is such a big problem in Tanzania as it is in other countries,” said Tanzanian businesswoman Queen Maro. That assessment is belied by oxygen shortages that earlier this year hit hospitals overwhelmed with patients displaying Covid-19 symptoms.

    “We aren’t seeing a huge number of patients as we did” between December and February, said a doctor in Dar es Salaam, who asked not to be identified as only four government officials are permitted to speak about the disease. “With the onset of the rainy season, I fear that a new wave of Covid-19 infections is coming and, believe me, it will be bad.”  — Reported by Antony Sguazzin, (c) 2021 Bloomberg LP



    top
    Subscribe to TechCentral Subscribe to TechCentral
    Share. Facebook Twitter LinkedIn WhatsApp Telegram Email Copy Link
    Previous ArticleVox ICE: A technology solution for caring for the elderly
    Next Article ByteDance founder steps down as CEO

    Related Posts

    18GW in unplanned breakdowns cripple Eskom

    2 November 2021

    Nersa kicks the Karpowership can down the road

    13 September 2021

    If you think South African load shedding is bad, try Zimbabwe’s

    13 September 2021
    Company News

    Ransomware in South Africa: the human factor behind the growing crisis

    16 July 2025

    Mental wellness at scale: how Mac fuels October Health’s mission

    15 July 2025

    Banking on LEO: Q-KON transforms financial services connectivity

    14 July 2025
    Opinion

    A smarter approach to digital transformation in ICT distribution

    15 July 2025

    In defence of equity alternatives for BEE

    30 June 2025

    E-commerce in ICT distribution: enabler or disruptor?

    30 June 2025

    Subscribe to Updates

    Get the best South African technology news and analysis delivered to your e-mail inbox every morning.

    © 2009 - 2025 NewsCentral Media

    Type above and press Enter to search. Press Esc to cancel.